Bureau B
Silber
When most people were glam(ming) it up in the mid seventies
Mr. Conrad was studio tinkering with possible futures. Messing with the building blocks of rhythm, harmony and melody to bleed a snakey elixir that formed this sixty minute
noir-riddled masterwork, suitably blighted in whir kittens and sci-fi weevils.
The tracks, frustratingly untitled (as they are on
Gold), ooze with encroaching darkness fish and elasticated light.
Circuitry floating buoyant bayonets of percussion and cog-scarred arabesques, later telepathically implanted into
Aphex Twin‘s skull, seeding comparison, evolution, gloop-swooping suspensions feeding the circle game for generations to come.
Gold
Clocking in at a further sixty minutes,
Gold continues the journey from ’76 through to ’78. Penned (I like to think ) when the majority were
John Travolta(ing) it to the ceiling in tight-fitting white suits, this is more melodically inclined than
Silber, with lots of addictive threads shining through. Tracks that bounce in Chinese banquets and
finger-jutting compounds, a Jarre-like parade of waving flags and nodding
Churchill doggies.
Schnitzler is deliberately groping towards something more solidly kinetic, beat-bound, interspersing his curiosity with sketchy down-tempo experiments. Rooting through the decaying composites of their DNA, the trembling ivories, dripping magnetisms, all that eerie residue, charity shopping for interesting combinations to reshuffle into the next sequential spine.
A lot of water has certainly flowed under the bridge since these first saw the light of day, but without a doubt there’s still many a lesson to be heard amongst these wizardy electronics.
-Michael Rodham-Heaps-
Silber
Gold
